Nissan faces potential plant closures globally amid cost-cutting, with Japanese government efforts to stabilize the company. Chinese automaker Shaomi battles quality issues and an alleged smear campaign while expanding its EV lineup. Major automakers like Mercedes, Toyota, Audi, and VW are revising EV naming strategies. BMW adopts generative AI to streamline supplier operations, while a study reveals suppliers favor Toyota, Honda, and GM over Nissan, Ford, and Stellantis, correlating with quality and profit differences. Chinese brand Aito surpasses German luxury rivals in sales, highlighting shifting market dynamics. Tesla Cybertruck trade-in values have sharply declined, and stop-start technology remains divisive among drivers.
Topics:nissan plant closureschinese ev marketautomaker ev naminggenerative ai in supply chainsupplier relationschinese luxury car brandstesla cybertruck depreciationstop-start technologyautomotive market trends
- Nissan Could Close Plants in Japan - Japanese Government Tries to Save Nissan - Xiaomi YU7 Targets Tesla Model Y - VW Drops ID Name for EVs - BMW Using Gen-AI in Purchasing - Suppliers Love GM, Hate Ford - Aito Shoves BMW, Mercedes, Audi Aside - Tesla Cybertruck Trade-In Values Plummet - Autoline Poll Results on Stop/Start
"...r electric truck has depreciated. A member of the Cybertruck Owners Club shared the trade and estimate of his ..."
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Speaker 1: This is Autoline Daily, the show dedicated to enthusiasts of the global automotive industry. Well, here's something that's extremely rare.
Nissan is planning to close at least to assembly plants in Japan. Those plants account for thirty percent of its
domestic production, and a report out of Japan says Nissan will also close two plants in Mexico, as well as ones in India, Argentina and South Africa. Nissan issued a
statement denying the report and said it's based on speculation. However,
the report does line up with cost cutting plans that Nissan revealed last week, which say it wants to close seven plants globally and cut twenty thousand jobs.
Speaker 2: If Nissan does.
Speaker 1: Close plants in Japan, it would be the first time since two thousand and one and will likely send shockways through Japanese society. That's why we believe that behind closed doors,
the Japanese government is doing all that it can to help Nissan survive. First, it tried to arrange a merger
between Nissan and Honda. When that fell apart, a new
report from Japan says that Toyota even offered to help.
The report doesn't say what came of the talks, and both automakers declined to comment. Last week, Nissan's new CEO,
Ivan Espinosa said the company is still quote evaluating potential partners, which could include Fox Cohn. The auto industry plays an
outsized role in the Japanese economy, and the government realizes that the industry faces unprecedented upheaval, which is why it's desperate to make Nissan healthy again. After settlling over two
hundred thousand examples of its very first model in less than a year, Chinese tech company Shaomi continues to generate negative headlines.
Speaker 2: Now.
Speaker 1: Owners have started revealing that the panels around the headlamps can warp when sitting out in the sun for long periods of time. The issue is covered under Shaomi's free
repair program and the fix is said to take around an hour. But it kind of makes you wonder how
something like this wasn't caught during vehicle testing and validation, you know, similar to panel.
Speaker 2: Glue that fails too fast.
Speaker 1: However, it looks like some of the complaints against the company have been blown out of proportion. Shaomi says it's
legal team uncovered and online smear campaign that started in December of last year and is now being investigated by Chinese authorities. The campaign is alleged to have set up
ten thousand social media accounts that used automatic content generators to make up false claims about the company, and there's likely little coincidence that this is all hitting at a critical time for Shoomi. The company's CEO announced today that
it's investing just under seven billion dollars over the next ten years to develop its own chips for smart phones, and on Thursday, it reveals its second ever model and its first SUV, the YU seven, which is also jumping into one of China's most competitive segments along with models like the Tesla Model Y. So what do you think
will shew me win back consumers in China. Mercedes is
dropping EQ from the start of its EV names and will instead put EQ technology at the end. Toyota dropped
four X from the BZ and gave its newest EV, the BZ Woodland, a more traditional name. Audi shuffled up
the naming of both its IC and EV models, and GM even dropped the all TM name, and now Volkswagen is the latest to follow in those footsteps. VW board
member Martin Sanders says future electric models will not use ID. Instead,
they will have quote unquote proper names. That means models
like the ID two and ID everyone will be called called something completely different. The production version of the ID two,
whatever it's called now, is scheduled to come out sometime next year.
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Speaker 1: GENAI is showing up everywhere, and BMW says it's now using it and it's purchasing operations. Automakers have to keep
track of thousands of components from thousands of suppliers all over the world, and using AI can slash the time it takes to cut through all that clutter. BMW is
using GENAI in the analysis and comparison of supplier offers, and in the future it will perform tasks without human supervision, like monitoring supply chain data and creating reports. Even though
BMW is talking about this publicly, we think that it's safe to say that all automakers and suppliers are working on the same thing. And speaking of supply the ones
in North America really like working with Toyota, Honda and General Motors, but they don't really like working with Nissan, Ford and Stilantis. That's the cliff notes of Plant Moran's
twenty twenty five Annual Supplier Workings Relation Index. Plant Moran
interviewed six hundred and sixty five supplier executives about how they feel the automakers treat them, how well they communicate with them, how much they trust them, how well they work together, whether they're paid on time, and a host of other topics. And there's a stark difference about how
the suppliers feel about Toyota, Honda and GM versus Nissan, Ford and Stilantis. And here's one interesting observation. We'll throw
into the mix. The automakers with good supplier relationships all
have higher quality ratings on the JD Power Vehicle Dependability Survey, and they also have higher profits on a per vehicle basis.
There's no concrete stat that we can point to that says better supplier relationships lead directly to higher quality and profits, but the anecdotal evidence is awfully compelling. By the way,
we posted an interview with the authors of the Plant Moran study, which you can find on the Autoline website and on our YouTube channel. BMW, Mercedes, and Audi have
been beaten up in the Chinese market, so have all the other foreign legacy automakers in China. But it's been
a shock to see the vaunted German brands lose sales and market share as easily as the mass market brands.
And while the German luxury brands promise they're going to fight their way back, here's an example of the uphill battle that they face. A car company called Series, which
up until recently was selling cheap little minivans for under five grand, shot past AUDIBMW and Mercedes to become the top luxury car brand by sales in China.
Speaker 2: So much for all their heritage.
Speaker 1: History and brand equity, it only took Series three years to.
Speaker 2: Climb past them.
Speaker 1: Sales tripled last year to four hundred and twenty seven thousand vehicles, and Bloomberg reports that its stock is up one hundred and twenty percent. Series is working with Huawei
to sell premium SUVs under the Ido brand, both electric and hybrid, and it sure is amazing to see that a cell phone maker and a cheap vanmaker could pull off a coup like this in such a short.
Speaker 2: Amount of time.
Speaker 1: Teslas started accepting trade ins of the cyber truck for new purchases, and owners are shocked at how much their electric truck has depreciated. A member of the Cybertruck Owners
Club shared the trade and estimate of his foundation Series with just over six thousand, two hundred miles. Tesla offered
him sixty five four hundred dollars. But remember only a
year ago that truck sold for one hundred grand. That
means it's residual value plunged more than a third.
Speaker 2: While that is a huge drop, maybe it's not too.
Speaker 1: Surprising since Tesla seems to be struggling to sell new cyber trucks.
Speaker 2: We've got the.
Speaker 1: Results of the latest Auto Line poll where we asked you what you thought of the stop start technology in cars where your engine turns off when your car comes to a stop and then starts again as soon as you take your foot off the brake. Only forty percent
of you said you liked the system, fifty percent said you hated it, and ten percent had other opinions. A
lot of you said it really depended on the car, like Michael Danberry, who said, I recall it working fine in my last gas car, Lincoln MKZ hybrid.
Speaker 2: I think it depends on the car.
Speaker 1: On other cars, it's very noticeable when it starts back up.
Speaker 2: A bunch of you, like Bill.
Speaker 1: Kerr, pointed out that it really quote works best with a hybrid drive, especially a PEV that doesn't need the engine to pull away from a stop. Electric AC compressors
are much more efficient and reduce the issue with stop start systems.
Speaker 2: Z's ninety nine five nine nine had a good suggestion.
Speaker 1: Just make it a setting that you can turn off once and it stays off, he says. Patrick O'Connell has
a point of view that's probably pretty typical. I didn't
like it at first, but I guess I got used to it because I haven't even thought about this in years, he says, And Mike Carter seemed to speak for.
Speaker 2: All you ev owners.
Speaker 1: Our electric cars seem to lack this feature, he says, somewhat sarcastically, So all you product planners in the audience take notice. There's a huge chunk of the car buying
public that does not like stop start. It looks like
you either need to make it more seamless or get rid of it altogether. But that's a wrap for this Monday.
Thanks for making autoline a part of your day.
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